Photographer’s Note

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The older people in my hometown all call the river “the sea”, and young people find it funny. I did too. When my father told me that, in his youth, the only way to reach Guangzhou was by boat, I was genuinely surprised. Were these rivers really connected? What we never realised was that we were actually living on islands.

 

I had never experienced the Pearl River with my own body. When we drive today, we pass stretches of water that seem broken and disconnected, yet they are part of the same dense network at the river’s mouth. Bridges and railways have changed the relationship between people and the land, and we might be the first generation to grow up without any real memory of rivers.

 

In 1838, the French painter Auguste Borget travelled by boat from Macao to Guangzhou, and in his diary he described a journey I had never imagined. 

 

“I am unwilling to dwell too long on the beauties of the grand canal, and yet it is necessary to say something of all this crowd of islands, in the midst of which are planted so many pagodas, differing from each other both in date and in the style of their architecture : some simple and square, with three or four stories, not unlike some of our village steeples, only each of the stories is marked by a little blue projection, turned up at the extremity ; others are hexagon, octagon, with four, six, seven stories. They are all beautifully situated, appearing as it were to start from the water, amidst fine masses of trees, either alone or close by the house of some mandarin. Nor must I forget those veils of bamboos, of such brilliant colours, which cover the water in every direction, and bend to every breath of air. "

 

I could not relate to his words; this was not the home I knew. Unlike missionaries or merchants who came to China at the same time, Borget had no religious or commercial purpose. He was simply a curious traveller, using his brush to record what he saw in the Southern China. Yet his drawings held me. The pagodas along the river, the old buildings and arches on the banks, depicted a Lingnan water world before industrialisation. Through the eyes of a foreigner, I was given a memory of my homeland that I never possessed.

 

To understand the world Borget saw, I began studying the history and geography of the Pearl River. It is not a single river, but a system of dense waterways. Its low-lying delta, tidal channels, and wide yet sheltered estuary, facing trade routes towards the Indian Ocean, made it inevitable that this place would become a meeting point for global trade, imperial control, and commercial pressure.

 

When Borget arrived, China was remain closed to the world under the Canton System. Guangzhou was the only port open to foreign trade, and Macao the only place foreigners were allowed to live. Movement between the two followed a seasonal rhythm. Merchants travelled upriver during the trading season and had to return to Macao when it ended. These waterways were the only China foreigners could access, a narrow opening through which the empire connected with the world.

 

Europe’s demand for tea, silk, and porcelain caused a serious trade imbalance, and Britain intervened by forcing opium into the system. The Opium Wars that followed unfolded largely along the Pearl River and its shores. In 1842, Britain occupied Hong Kong on the eastern side of the estuary, turning the river mouth into a space divided by colonial power. The Pearl River became one of the earliest places where modern global capitalism, imperial violence, and treaty systems were physically implemented. Borget recorded the landscape just before China was fully drawn into globalisation.

 

By the late twentieth century, the Pearl River became a turning point again. It was one of the first regions to implement China’s Reform and Opening-up. Factories, export-processing zones, and logistics networks developed along the river, and the area gradually became known as the “world’s factory”. Global trade reshaped the landscape once more, this time driven not by empire but by industrial production.

 

For centuries, the Pearl River has absorbed forces from around the world: maritime trade, colonial expansion, population movement, and industrial capitalism. Its history is not a single national story, but a series of encounters shaped by geography. Its importance lies not only in what once passed through it, but in how the world has repeatedly returned to it.

 

In Chinese culture, water is linked to wealth. The flow of rivers brings material prosperity and also shapes the rhythm of life and social order. Ports, docks, fishing villages, and farmland grew around waterways. Rivers were central to trade, daily life, and culture. With globalisation and modernisation, the Pearl River’s landscape and function began to change. In 1984, National Road 105 connected the delta’s islands, and ferries gradually disappeared. Later, high-speed rail and highways made crossing the estuary effortless. The river’s role as a commuting route was reduced and replaced.

 

At the same time, people’s relationship with the river changed fundamentally. Life, work, and seasonal activities were once closely tied to water. Over decades, boat-dwelling fishing communities moved ashore, ports shifted from inland rivers to the sea, and farmland and fish ponds were replaced by factories, housing developments, and towers. Today, people may walk, fish, or admire the river, but the movement of water has become abstract, part of the cityscape. It no longer shapes daily life. The river feels fragmented.

 

The Pearl River still generates wealth. Factories, ports, and logistics centres along its banks support global trade. Yet the river itself has gradually become a “non-place”. We pass it. We cross it. But we no longer experience it. Its power to shape people has been overwritten by modern life. My generation seems to have lost a bodily connection to land and nature. If water once meant wealth, what does the river mean to us now?

 

Even though the Pearl River estuary is crucial in the global economy, its landscapes are often overlooked. Compared with the cities along it — Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Macao, Shenzhen — the river itself seems hardly worth seeing. It has none of the Yellow River’s dramatic terrain, nor the Yangtze’s varied scenery. Its landscapes sit at the edges. Borget’s drawings and diary revived my curiosity about geography and landscape, giving me a reason to physically retrace a water route.

 

I tried to observe traces of the past, while quietly looking at the modern landscape. The journey was solitary. I was not trying to document people or get close to life on the riverbanks. I only wanted to imagine the flow of time through observation, to understand and deconstruct what I saw, to imagine how it had been erased and rebuilt by history. The pagoda-filled river scenes Borget described no longer exist. Towers that once marked waterways have been demolished or buried in concrete and steel. Seeing them on the river today requires effort. These towers feel like gravestones of a lost Pearl River, preserved as heritage, lifted out of life, made into specimens. Together with old maps, ferry names, sampans, looms, antique clocks, porcelain, and embroidery, they are kept in museums for those who care to see.

 

Yet the Pearl River still flows into the sea through eight gates. It moves toward the sea, opens to the distance. This is not the edge of land, but a crack where it meets the world.

 

 

 

我們故鄉的老人都把大河叫做“海”，年輕人都覺得可笑，我也不例外。當父親告訴我他年輕的時候去廣州只能坐船的時候，我深感驚訝：這些河流是連通的嗎？無知的是，我們並不知道我們其實生活在島嶼上。

 

我未曾用行動去感知過珠江。當我們坐車穿過那一條條支離破碎的河流，實則相連的河流，其實是珠江口密集的水網。橋樑和鐵路改變了人和土地的關係，我們可以說是第一代沒有河流記憶的人。

 

1838年，法國畫家Auguste Borget從澳門乘船前往廣州，他在日記裡描述了這段我從未想像過的水途見聞。其中有這樣一段航程中河景：

 

 

“我本不想在大运河的美景上多作停留，但，亲爱的朋友，我又不得不与你说起那些半岛与无数岛屿——在它们之中，矗立着形制各异、年代不同的宝塔。有的朴素方正，三四层高，颇似乡村的教堂钟楼，只是每一层的檐角都挑出一抹蓝色的飞檐。也有呈六边形或八边形的，高达四层、六层、七层，从水面拔地而起，或孤立于一片绿树之间，或依傍在某位官员的宅邸旁，无不令人赏心悦目。我也忘不了那些竹篷船的帆——色彩柔美，穿行于江面四方，微风一来，便轻轻倾斜，宛若在水面上低语。”

 

 

這段段文字我無法感同身受，那不是我認知的家鄉。与同时代来华的传教士或商人不同，Borget此行并无宗教或通商目的，他只是一個好奇的旅行者，用畫筆記錄南方旅途所見。他在旅途中的畫作卻讓我看得入迷，那些河邊聳立的風水古塔、那些河岸的老建築和牌坊，描繪的是一個前工業時代的嶺南水鄉。一個外來人竟然給我展示了一段我未曾擁有的關於故土的前世記憶。

 

為了理解Borget看到的那個世界，我開始研究珠江的歷史與地理。珠江並不是一條單一的河流，而是一個由密集水道構成的系統。低平的三角洲沖積地形、受潮汐影響的河道，以及寬闊而相對隱蔽的河口，加上面向馬六甲，迎著通往向印度洋的貿易航線，使珠江無可避免成為世界貿易、帝國管制與商業壓力交會的港口。

 

Borget來到珠江口的時候，封閉的中國實施一口通商制度，只允許廣州作為唯一的通商口岸，而澳門則是唯一允許外國人居住的地方。兩地之間的移動遵循著季節性的節奏：商人在通商季節沿水路進入廣州，季節結束後必須離開返回澳門。這些水路是外國人唯一能接觸到的中國，是當年帝國向世界打開的一條裂縫。 

 

歐洲對茶葉、絲綢與瓷器的巨大需求造成了嚴重的貿易失衡，英國遂以鴉片強行介入這一貿易體系。由此引發的鴉片戰爭主要發生在珠江流域及其沿岸。1842年，英國在珠江口東側佔領香港，使河口空間成為一個被殖民權力分割的地帶。珠江因此成為現代全球資本主義、帝國暴力與條約體系最早被具體實施的場所之一。而Borget在這個節點，記錄了一個中國被捲入全球化之前最後的風景。

 

到了二十世紀後期，珠江流域再次成為轉折點——它成為中國最早推行改革開放的地區。工廠、出口加工區與物流網絡沿河發展，使此地逐漸被稱為「世界工廠」。全球貿易再次重塑了這片景觀，只是這一次不再以帝國為形式，而是以工業生產為主導。

 

數個世紀以來，珠江不斷吸收來自世界的力量：海上貿易、殖民擴張、人口移動與工業資本主義。它的歷史並不是單一的民族敘事，而是一系列由地理條件驅動的世界和中國的交會。珠江的重要性，不僅在於曾經流經此地的事物，更在於世界一次次回到這裡。

 

中國人以水為財，水的流動不僅帶來物質繁榮，也塑造了生活節奏與社會秩序。港口、碼頭、漁村和農田圍繞河水生長，河道是貿易通路、日常生活與文化活動的中樞。

隨著全球化和現代化的推進，珠江的景觀與功能正經歷改變。1984年，105國道把三角洲的島嶼串聯一起，船渡日漸淘汰。此後高鐵和高速公路的興建，橫跨珠江口已經不再是難題。曾經河流的通勤功能被壓縮、被取代。

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與此同時，人對河流的感知與依附方式也發生了根本性轉變。過去，生活、工作與節令活動都與水密切相關；幾十年來蜑家漁民逐漸遷移上岸，港口從內河向外海轉移，三角洲的農田與魚塘逐步被工廠、房地產和高樓取代。今天，可能有人在河邊散步、釣魚或觀景，但水的流動性被抽象化為城市景觀，不再塑造日常經驗，它是支離破碎的。珠江依然孕育財富，沿岸的工廠、港口、物流中心支撐著全球貿易，但河流逐漸退化成為了一種“非場所(Non-Places)”，我們經過它，跨越它，卻不再體驗它。它塑造人的方式早已經被現代化改寫。我們這一代人，似乎失去了一種對土地和自然的身體認同。如果水為財，那麼河水在現代人心中是什麼？

 

就好比說，雖然珠江口這片地方在全球經濟體系中舉足輕重，比起沿路廣州、香港、澳門、深圳的都市景觀，河流的風景卻甚至已經“不值得被觀看”。它沒有黃河的壯美地貌，也沒有長江的多元風景，珠江的景色都是都市的邊緣。Borget的畫作與日記讓我拾起一個對於地理風景考察的好奇，給了我一個契機去用身體和行動去重新找回一段水路的經驗。

 

我試圖去觀察尋找一些屬於過去的肌理，也去靜觀現代的景觀。這個旅程是孤獨的，我並沒有刻意想要用攝影去做人文紀錄，去深入地近距離去接觸河邊的人。我只想要在觀察中想像時間的流動，如何去理解並且解構眼前所見的景觀，想像它如何被歷史數次抹去再重建。Borget描繪的那番塔影河景終究不再存在。曾經作為航道座標的古塔要麼被拆除，要麼被鋼筋水泥淹沒。我發現，在河上想要見到這些塔是多麼的費力。這些塔是一個逝去的珠江的墓碑，僅存的以文化保育的姿態，被高高裱起為一個不起眼的標本，它們與古老的地圖、渡口的名字、舢舨船、織布機、西洋鐘、瓷器、刺繡一起被供奉進博物館，僅給有興趣的人瞻仰。

 

但珠江依然从八个门奔流入海。向海而生，向远方而开。这里不是陆地的边缘，而是它与世界相接的裂缝。